Odoo Raises $90M To Advance Open Source ERP

Odoo brings in new funds as it aims to further expand its enterprise resource planning platform.

Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software has long been dominated by established proprietary vendors, but that's not to say there isn't open source competition in the market.

Odoo, a company formerly known as OpenERP, develops a suite of open source ERP tools and has built a solid user base of over 4.5 million users. The core open source Odoo community version is complemented with the Odoo enterprise edition that adds proprietary features useful for larger organizations.

In December 2019, Odoo got a strong vote of confidence, with an investment of $90 million, led by Summit Partners, with the participation of existing investor SRIW and its affiliate Noshaq. Total funding to date for Odoo is approximately $104 million.

"In our experience, traditional ERP is expensive and frequently fails to adapt to the unique needs of dynamic businesses," Antony Clavel, a Principal with Summit Partners who has joined the Odoo Board of Directors, wrote in a statement. "With its flexible suite of applications and a relentless focus on product, we believe Odoo is ideally positioned to capture this large and compelling market opportunity."

Odoo 13

The end of 2019 was also noteworthy for the release of Odoo 13, which introduces multiple enhancements across the ERP suite. The accounting module in Odoo 13 benefits from improved usability additions as well as new reporting capabilities.

Another big area of improvement is in the Field Service Management module, which benefits from a new map view. Field Service Management integrates time tracking, reporting, invoicing and other time management functions.

The marketing tools in Odoo are also being expanded with new SMS and Social marketing capabilities. Those now features join the existing marketing automation, email marketing and content management functions that Odoo already had in the suite.

"My goal in founding Odoo was to make a difference, I wanted to create software that powers the growth of businesses and changes the world," stated Fabien Pinckaers, Odoo Founder and CEO. "In order to achieve this, we’ve had to work hard, build a team and innovate at every turn."

Sean Michael Kerner is a senior editor at EnterpriseAppsToday and InternetNews.com. Follow him on Twitter @TechJournalist.